OVER 80 WORKERS BAY FOR SMAWU LEADER’S BLOOD

MBABANE – About 80 workers set camp overnight at the entrance of Mondeles International while laying ambush for a union member.

The workers wanted answers from an employee they identified as Zweli Sihlongonyane, who is said to be Secretary General of the Swaziland Manufacturing and Allied Workers Union (SMAWU). The employees of YKK Zippers, Swaziland Milling and Exipro arrived at Sihlongonyane’s workplace as early as 5:10pm after they knocked off from their respective workplaces.

By 8:30pm, when the Swazi News team left the place, the workers were still there, insisting they were going to remain there until Sihlongonyane knocked off at 10pm.
Their presence at the gate prompted officials of Mondeles International to call the Matsapha police, who arrived promptly and addressed the workers. After that, the police went into the company premises and promised to have a discussion with Sihlongonyane.

About an hour later, Sihlongonyane was seen walking within the premises from the main building to an adjacent one where the police had been seen going into earlier on.
Another hour went by before Sihlongonyane could be seen returning to the main building. This happened shortly after a senior official of the company, identified only as Shongwe, addressed a few members of the aggrieved workers.

angry

During the briefing that was attended by this reporter, Shongwe explained that the company officials called the police because of the presence of the angry group of workers outside their premises.
“The police have had a meeting with Sihlongonyane in a bid to figure out how and where he could meet you because it would not be proper for your meeting to take place here,” he explained to the team that was led by Ntokozo Mshayisa.
Deputy Police Information and Communications Officer Nosipho Mnguni confirmed that the police responded to a call to restore peace and protect company property. “We were there to keep peace. The police who attended engaged the workers and advised the workers accordingly,” she said.

Mshayisa revealed that there were certain questions that they needed to ask Sihlongonyane following unsuccessful negotiations with their respective employers. “We are very bitter about certain issues and we feel he is in the right position to shed some light,” he said.
He said the matter was so serious such that they had already had a meeting with Commissioner of Labour Sipho Tsabedze on Thursday. “Sihlongonyane was also present at the meeting that was held at the commissioner’s offices. The issues we deliberated on were not concluded and the meeting was deferred to Tuesday.”

Meeting

When asked what they would do if they failed to meet Sihlongonyane after work, the workers who were gathered around Mshayisa said they would hire a bus and head to his home in Maliyaduma. Tsabedze confirmed having a meeting with members of the union.
He said: “During the meeting it transpired that SMAWU’s National Executive Committee is divided into two factions. Since we were meeting for the third time, we felt that in our next meeting, we would delve into the substantive issue.”
The commissioner said on Tuesday he would be meeting with the executive that was in office in 2013, before the purported amalgamation of SMAWU and the Amalgamation of Trade Unions in Swaziland (ATUSWA).
Sihlongonyane said he was willing to meet the employees and attend to their concerns. “It’s just that my employer could not allow me to meet them yesterday for security reasons,” he said.

He said he even conveyed the same message to the police to pass on to the workers who were waiting for him outside the gate. He did mention that there was an intervention that was currently being handled by the office of the commissioner of labour.

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